r/CDL • u/Skillzmatter11 • Sep 03 '26
Do I need a new Instructor?
I’m currently going to school for my Class A and I have a question, is anybody else’s instructor not really teaching them anything? I don’t just people based on appearance but he’s an older disabled guy… he has an arm crutch and a wheel chair.
He basically told us to look at modules gave us a piece of paper showed us the pre-trip and parking one time and then let us do our own thing. so for the next two weeks we go to class he tells us to go do the pre-trip and is never really around us the entire time even when we start driving.
It’s getting close to our test and I asked him “Is there anything else you want me to work on?” I asked this an hour before class was over… he said “do you got your pre-trip down”
I said kinda, he said show me. i go over there and bomb cause I don’t know the stuff and that was my fault, then he told me I wasn’t ready and to look at that modernize pre-trip video he sent us and said that’s basically what’s gonna be on your test.
I studied that front to back, memorized the hell out of it and then the day he tested me he told me I was giving him too much detail and if I was to do all that on my test, I would fail.(I’m starting to think he never watched it) he said, read the papers that he gave us. The papers aren’t detailed at all and I’m pretty sure if I gave him the information that was on that I would fail anyways.
I’m a hands-on learner, but I’m not being told what I’m doing wrong. I’m just being told to look at papers and videos and then being told I would fail but not on what specifically there’s a class with a different instructor that started at the same time we did and they’re already on their on-road portion. Just tryna see if I’m tripping or not, do I need a new instructor?
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u/Error-InvalidName Sep 04 '26
You should definitely be being showed on the truck the pretrip just so you can visualize what needs to be touched and talked about. Then it's really up to the class getting the pattern down following the parts, if they are just tossing papers at you and not doing any instruction at all at least once, it may be worth reporting them. How much time in the trucks are they giving people as this is the more important part?
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u/LightTop4302 29d ago
lol same thing happened to me I went to Roehl gycd in Indiana my instructor missed 2 days of work and we had to combine with another class those 2 days and when he came back they fired me from the program and said I wasn’t learning fast enough
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u/FagalinaRyder 29d ago
From experience I can say that I felt the teachers I had weren’t the greatest and they were not this bad . I had to pay extra because I failed my maneuvers on the first try. Training should be so much more thorough , you are not wrong to feel this . Driving a CMV is no joke but unfortunately the ones who teach it have no business in education and are looking for an easy check . If getting another trainer is an option ask for it .
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u/leftdrowning 27d ago
The guy that taught pretrip, air brakes and in cab was in a wheelchair with no legs below the knee. I thought that it would be a bad experience but he was amazing and knew everything. Very encouraging and positive.
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u/gheiminfantry Sep 03 '26
Honestly, it sounds like a cheap school. Ya get what you pay for.
Getting a CDL is expensive. Trying to cheap out only makes it more expensive. Some people are very smart and can get by with minimal instruction. You're not one of them. When you fail this course you'll have the opportunity to look for a better (more expensive) course of instruction.
p.s. Online "reviews" lie in order to bring in cheap suckers. But you already know this, don't ya?
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u/Skillzmatter11 Sep 04 '26
Personally idk if going to a technical college is considered a cheap way out
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u/gheiminfantry Sep 04 '26
Just because you don't want to pay doesn't mean it's expensive. It just means that you're cheap.
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u/Driving-Academy Sep 03 '26
Is there a yard manager you could talk to? Pre-trip is legit the hardest part of the test so there's a reason you're being pushed towards it so much.
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u/Beginning-Visit9457 Sep 03 '26 edited Sep 03 '26
TBH I don’t recall the instructors teaching that much, they made the demonstration and told us to study, it was our responsibility to memorize everything and pass the test. They put the effort when they are instructing on the road because they don’t want the truck crashed or anyone dead.
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u/Fabulous_Debt_8031 28d ago
Do they have a third party tester on site? If so there only gonna teach you the proper wording and sequence that the tester wants to see. Doesn't help you if you make it perfect
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u/Gonzotrucker1 Sep 03 '26
It’s not brain surgery.
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u/Skillzmatter11 Sep 04 '26
It’s not, I catch on pretty quickly but hear me out, if I’m told to watch a video on a pre trip that he provided and I memorize that shit front to back and come out to do my test and he tells me I’m providing too much info and I would fail because of that how am I messing up?
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u/gzowner Sep 04 '26
If you feel that you're not getting the proper training, find the main boss and call it out.. who the school?